{"id":1303,"date":"2016-06-03T08:00:38","date_gmt":"2016-06-03T08:00:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/admin.criagenesis.cc\/?p=1303"},"modified":"2016-06-03T08:01:14","modified_gmt":"2016-06-03T08:01:14","slug":"feeding-urea-to-alpacas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/admin.criagenesis.cc\/feeding-urea-to-alpacas\/","title":{"rendered":"Feeding urea to alpacas"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Urea is a non-protein source of nitrogen that can be used by fore-gut fermenters such as alpacas, goats, sheep and cattle as a source of protein. The microbes in the first compartment of the stomach are able to convert the nitrogen in urea (chemical formula CO(NH<sub>2<\/sub>)<sub>2<\/sub>; containing approximately 46% nitrogen depending on purity) into microbial protein, that is then available to the host for digestion.<\/p>\n<p>Urea can form up to 1% of the total ration of an alpaca per day, on a dry matter (DM) basis. So a 70 kg alpaca, eating 1.5% of its bodyweight per day (maintenance ration) will consume approximately 1.05 kg DM per day. Thus 1% of this is approximately 10 g of urea\/adult alpaca\/day. Therefore, if you are feeding out pellets manufactured for adult ruminants as a supplement to adult alpacas:<\/p>\n<ol>\n<li>Check the amount of urea in the pellets e.g. 3% urea<\/li>\n<li>Weigh how many pellets each animal is receiving e.g. 200 g\/adult alpaca<\/li>\n<li>Calculate amount of urea each animal is consuming per day: 3% of 200 g = 6 g urea\/head\/day<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<ul>\n<li>Always introduce supplements slowly so the microbes have time to adjust to new feeds over 10-14 days.<\/li>\n<li>Be aware that urea can kill ruminants if too much is consumed too quickly.<\/li>\n<li>Ensure that the ratio of nitrogen to sulfur in the ration is 13:1 when supplementing with urea.<\/li>\n<li>Remember Dr LaRue Johnson\u2019s adage: \u201cYou do not have to feed alpacas pellets, because they make their own\u201d! Think about supplementing with whole oats and lupins instead!<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Urea is a non-protein source of nitrogen that can be used by fore-gut fermenters such as alpacas, goats, sheep and cattle as a source of protein. The microbes in the first compartment&#8230; <a class=\"moretag hidemob\" href=\"https:\/\/admin.criagenesis.cc\/feeding-urea-to-alpacas\/\"> read&nbsp;more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1042,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15,19],"tags":[],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/admin.criagenesis.cc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1303"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/admin.criagenesis.cc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/admin.criagenesis.cc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/admin.criagenesis.cc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/admin.criagenesis.cc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1303"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/admin.criagenesis.cc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1303\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/admin.criagenesis.cc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1042"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/admin.criagenesis.cc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1303"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/admin.criagenesis.cc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1303"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/admin.criagenesis.cc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1303"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}